I tried making a Reddit account and it asked me to build karma before I could ask on any of the relevant subs so I’m posting here.
I can personally say that if anything goes up there, it hurts, and not in a good way. It does not feel pleasurable at all. It feels kind of like placing a finger on an open sore and pushing down.
Also, if you’re being examined, they tell you to take deep breaths, as if they know that anything going up is going to be painful. If sex is supposed to be pleasurable and enjoyable, why would doctors tell you to brace for impact, so to speak?
Lastly, women often scream during sex. It’s often said they’re screaming out of pleasure and not pain. But there are a lot of things I find extremely pleasurable, but I don’t scream while I do them.
Is it just one of those things that is painful but we’re conditioned into believing the pain is actually pleasure and I must have inconsistent pain tolerance and I am making a big deal out of this?
I made a snarky comment but after reading the body I realize you’re a female OP.
Go see a doctor. Yes women do enjoy sex and if it’s painful or uncomfortable you might need to get something checked out.
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If the docor said “this is going to feel good” that would be a lot weirder
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Several reasons. One, they’re sticking a metal thing in there, and that can be painful, especially if they don’t use enough lube. I remind them to use a lot. :) Two, you may be having a lot of anxiety and tightening up all your muscles (I know I do!) so that makes it harder for them to insert the thing–hence, they tell you to take breaths and try to relax. Also, I always try to go to a woman gynecologist. I’m more comfortable with someone who knows what it’s like and they’re usually much nicer, so that helps.
The expectation of pain is a huge factor for my partner, she has to be TOTALLY RELAXED to enjoy anything.
And this developed after us being together for like 10 years. We had super fun, impromptu sex whenever, and then that started to go away.
Point is, expectations of pain can make sex painful. So OP has a hill to climb to get to easy, comfortable sex.
Medicine traditionally does not consider the pain of women or children to be worthy of consideration. They only started using anesthesia on infants in the 1980s, as doctors had convinced themselves that infants couldn’t feel pain, for some reason.
There are two parts to this. For starters, sex without arousal is also painful. During arousal, you secrete lubricants, the vaginal cavity expands as blood flows to it, and your body dampens pain reception across the entire body. Most people are not aroused by medical examinations and given your examples for experiences I’d say you’re definitely not getting hot and bothered by it. So the difference is eating a candy that you’re excited for compared to eating plain bread with a dry mouth.
Second is that your doc may be aware of your issue and forewarning you so you’re prepared. Given the way you talk about it, I’d imagine you’re probably on the younger side. If you’re getting your first few exams, or have been direct about your experiences so far then it’s likely they’re playing it safe for your comfort.
Lastly, talk to your Doctor about this issue, here are some examples so you know the verbage. I’m a guy but I do have second hand experience. I long distanced a gal who had surgery for microperforate hymen before we met and was incredibly scared of penetration in any way. It didn’t work out for other reasons, but we had a lot of fun building her confidence and other interests. The mother of my child had a partial transverse vaginal septum, it led to a sharp and buring pain at the entrance during penetration outside of a specific angle. This was “solved” during child birth when the doc had to snip her to allow the baby to come out. After getting stitched back correctly (no husband stitches here) she ended up having quite the sexual awakening. Lastly, my now spouse had a rotated womb which lead to abdominal pain during arousal as it pinched the womb. This was remedied.by a full hysterectomy for unrelated purposes.
Point being, there’s a lot of variables in the area and it would do good to read up on some of the issues, do some self exploration to get a good handle on what your symptoms are, and them talk to your Doctor about it.
Full disclosure: am a guy.
Holding your breath allows you to tense up and clench more than you can while breathing. Taking a deep breath eliminates some “tensing” muscles from the equation. Still, with some effort (or anxiety, probably) you can still clench up while breathing.
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Hi OP, I’m an asexual woman with endometriosis and chronic pelvic pain. Coming at it from this perspective.
Consider that some people find fisting and stuffing jars up their butt pleasurable. People are really weird, so no matter what you think of someone is going to find it pleasurable. Just because they find something pleasurable doesn’t mean you also have to.
If you don’t find something pleasurable, that’s okay. You don’t have to do it, ever. How you describe your pain is how I feel trying to do butt stuff and I just absolutely do not want to engage with it because it doesn’t feel good. I’m not going to go to a doctor to get my butt examined so I can do butt stuff, and I’m sure most the men in this post telling you shit wouldn’t do that, either.
You can have sex without penetration, if you want to. It’s fine not to have sex at all. It’s also fine not to even masturbate. Sexuality shouldn’t be compulsory.
I have a friend who couldn’t do penetrative sex, so her and her husband went to sex clubs and did lots of kink stuff without penetration and she says it was great. Don’t limit yourself to the idea that sex is only penis in vagina. A lot of men to try to tell you that. Hanging out in queer communities has opened my mind to a lot of possibilities.
Vaginismus exists. You probably have it. Doctors are really shit at detecting it. Gynecologists generally only care about delivering babies. Its like my experience trying to get treated for endo. You don’t just go to a doctor and get treated for pelvic pain like a lot of comments seem to be handwaving. It’s a dehumanizing experience and your pain will probably be ignored anyway.
I personally vouch that pelvic floor physical therapists are amazing, but I totally get why someone wouldn’t want to do that. It’ll also probably take multiple doctors and all the pain and violation that comes with repeat exams so it’s completely valid not to engage with the medical system. It was not made for women.
It is perfectly okay to stay as you are and explore non penetrative sex.
That said, the actual answer to your question is that, yes, I am a woman who finds vaginal sex pleasurable. I don’t experience pain from it unless the endo is flaring. However, it causes chronic UTIs amid the other overmedicalized bullshit that sex brings when you are AFAB, so I don’t do it much anyway.
This was a very illuminating post, and expanded my horizons on the human experience. If I may, can I ask what AFAB stands for in this context? I don’t want to just try searching the internet because acronyms can be tricky to get right, even with context.
Assigned Female at Birth. Sounds better than ‘has a vagina/uterus’ IMO as I don’t want to label people by what genitals they have and sometimes that can change anyway.
It is not supposed to be painful. If it is, then talk to a health professional.
Do not force yourself to have sex if it is painful! That might give you an aversion to it
If you are not old enough to do that without parents, then see if there is a school nurse, or other services for young people.
FYI: I am a man, but I know that women are supposed to enjoy sex.
Not a woman here but coning from my wife: fuck yes, women enjoy sex and a lot of it. When she comes, she screams every time.
If sexual intercourse isn’t pleasurable for you, or even painful, you may wnat to consult with a physician tonfigurr out what could cause your discomfort or pain, and to try and fix it
Sex is (and should be) awesome and amazing for everyone. I feel you’re missing out on something wonderful and hope that you’ll be able to fix this issue.
Beat wishes!
In case it wasn’t mentioned already, consider looking into pelvic physical therapy. They specialize in this area and treat physical problems that cause pain during sexual activity, bodily functions, etc. I see one and it has helped me a lot!
My wife has had an issue with pain during penetration that turned out to be caused by the depo birth control shot. It’s a rare side effect that no one told her about.
Your problem is defining “sex” as “being penetrated”. I am a woman, and do not enjoy being penetrated, and still enjoy sex. I’ve only put menstrual cups and a speculum up there before but I found it painful and difficult, like trying to push the cup up against a brick wall. I know women who have this problem and want to receive penetrative sex do vaginal dilation, but I’m not interested in that, so I don’t bother.
If you like the idea of being penetrated, you might want to try seeing a gynaecologist about vaginismus. But this isn’t inherently a problem if you don’t actually want to use your vagina during sex. You might prefer giving over receiving, or you might only want clitoral stimulation.
Gay people (including us lesbians) have the concept of being a top (wanting to give penetrative sex) or a bottom (wanting to receive penetrative sex). I think it would improve straight people’s sex lives to have the same thing tbh. I think some straight women probably are tops and some straight men probably are bottoms even though they’re interested in the opposite sex. If you like the idea of fucking a man with a strap-on over getting penetrated yourself, give it a go :) And if you just don’t like the idea of sex at all, you’re under no obligation to have it.
That’s a great response! I am male but don’t particularly like penetrative sex either. I much prefer to perform cunnilingus.
Endometriosis. PCOS. Look them both up and please, please, please go see a doctor.
Ex had endo, it’s a fucking nightmare.
We heavily modified our sex lives to adjust to it, a lot more foreplay and a lot less penetration.
I have screamed uncontrollably from pleasure until I lost my voice. It was too much but my partner refused to stop because they knew exactly what they were doing and no safeword was said. I like pain, I like pleasure, I like sex. Sometimes it starts as pain and becomes pleasure, sometimes it’s the other way around, sometimes it goes back and forth.
If you aren’t having fun, you aren’t having fun. Though, sometimes, vocalizing at all is a flood gate.
Yes. I am a woman and really enjoy sex. Less so when I was younger but it is not supposed to hurt, no. Two questions:
What happens when you put in a tampon?
Are you really very aroused before trying penetration?
ETA - people are recommending lube but lube does not substitute for arousal. Lube only helps slip - arousal makes space, adds slip, and relaxes the opening of the vagina some, so that there is room for a penis (or fingers or whatever). Sex is amazing but you need to be turned on to enjoy it.
I used to think this and it took me far too long to realise that men aren’t icky, I’m just a raging lesbian.
As another raging lesbian, I still think men are pretty icky. But they’re bumbling around all this the same we are
Could be endometriosis.
I swear I saw exactly that post a few weeks ago…
Same, seems vaginismus is a common thing
Have you had pleasure from other types of stimulation, other than penetrative?
Very interesting thread.
Just a little side note for everyone. Climax. The word you’re looking for is climax. Or orgasm if you want to be totally technical. Not come, or cum. Climax.
Everyone is using some form of cum/come when talking about climax and I think it might be a little confusing for op.
As far as i can tell women do actually enjoy putting things up there. Hard to imagine the sex toy market would be as big as it is if this was some collective hallucination to mask pain.
Again, dude here but I assume the reason doctors tell you to brace yourself for things like that is because inserting things isnt pleasurable unless you are properly aroused and I cant imagine many women are aroused by medical checkups.
I’d wager your issue is more that you arnt properly aroused when you are putting things up there…that OR you’ve got some kind of medical condition that you should probably bring up to a doctor.
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Because that’s not what they’re feeling.
I’m not sure why you’re feeling that way — but it sounds like something you should look into. Do you have any over or under sensitivities to other sensations?
Yea, it sounds like you’ve got a medical problem. As a guy I obviously dont know first hand but I have been in a 15 year relationship that averages sex 3-4 times a week and I can pretty confidently say that putting things up there should feel good. Hell, I dont think the strap-on market would exist if it didnt. Too many lesbians doing things to eachothers holes for it all to be some mass trauma response thats turning pain into pleasure.
Because they may have different anatomy or sensory feedback than yourself. Many women enjoy sex, some scream out of animalistic intensity of the pleasure, especially during an ejaculatory climax
